


Blind Orpheus

by Jimmy_Rustled_Bird



Category: Final Fantasy XIV
Genre: Climbing, F/M, Fix It, Post ShB, Self-Indulgent, Somebody Lives/Not Everyone Dies, lancer spoilers, owning a house, this is ridiculous (canon)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-15
Updated: 2020-02-15
Packaged: 2021-02-27 22:22:10
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,543
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22733242
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Jimmy_Rustled_Bird/pseuds/Jimmy_Rustled_Bird
Summary: Following her return from the First Shard, Mingxia buys a house.  She finds, however, that due to where her house is, she is often thinking of the mentor and friend she lost.  Taking a trip to the cliffs where they last spoke, she finally decides she wants to know for certain- and goes to seek her answers at the bottom of the cliff.
Relationships: Foulques/Original Female Character, Foulques/Warrior of Light (Final Fantasy XIV)
Comments: 4
Kudos: 21





	Blind Orpheus

_ Orpheus, for your songs, take your beloved back to the land of the living. But have a care and do not look back until sunlight touches you both. _

Mingxia wiped her forehead with her sleeve as she drove the final nail into her newly-acquired cottage in the Lavender Beds. Absently she thought she ought to prepare a gift for Nijoh’ir and Amasar, her fellow adventurers in the Free Company she was currently part of. They had stayed with her for most of the evening up until she was able to actually obtain her plot and house- and Amasar had even gone to the trouble to get her an aetheryte crystal for her front yard. She felt a bit bad, but mostly grateful to them, for they were also the ones that alerted her to the presence of said empty lot in the first place, and urged her to buy the house.

It was about time, anyroad. She'd seen some things- not that it was much different from most of her friends and colleagues, after all, didn't every adventurer and important project manager have their share of tragedy? And she, like many of her fellows, was getting rather well-acquainted with death and drama. She wanted a break, a chance to let her guard down for a few minutes and try to grow something without worrying that sometime in the next bell her linkpearl would go off because of work.

If she was being totally honest, she wished she could  _ forget _ certain things, too.

She sighed as she set up her garden and began the process of moving what few possessions she had into her new home, pointedly ignoring anything red or pink.

It was almost Valentione's after all. How unpleasant. She'd gone to participate in the festivities, only to find that she was to help the one person she never wanted to see again. The...dare she say it, negligent guildmaster of the Lancer’s Guild. Even though she'd graduated almost a year ago, the ire she had never seemed to subside.

She'd liked her mentor. Foulques was a fun teacher, and she actually enjoyed talking to him outside of lessons. If only she hadn't been so stupidly obedient. If only she'd learned to be defiant sooner. If only she'd had a guildmaster that didn't just sit there, show off and then do nothing. It was as much her fault as his.

_ I mean for crying out loud that poor older brother is still outside that stupid guild getting harassed. No wonder the Wailers are such a mess. Go and stand on your dais, Ywain, while there are people in need outside your hall that you aren't helping. _

She heard a soft  _ crack  _ under her left hand. She sighed again, noticing she'd gripped her flowerpot so hard she'd slightly bent the top of it. She set it down near the windowsill, taking care not to bump her newly-built table and chairs.

_ I need to go for a walk. All I'm doing is upsetting myself. ...I wish Foulques were here. He'd probably tell me to go challenge Ywain. Come to think of it, Nijoh'ir did say I could go try to punch out Ywain whenever, since I live so close. Maybe I'll do that sometime, to honour my senior.  _

That decided, she got up, locked the door and wandered through old Gridania, stopping to yell at and chase off the offending lancers in front of the guild, and watching as the poor fellow they were harassing finally went on his way. She avoided the amphitheatre as best as she could, and left out the north gate. For nostalgia's sake, she donned her strawberry pink trainee's armour, her Scaevan spear the only sign that she wasn't the newbie she appeared to be.

She wandered aimlessly, and before she realized where she was, she found herself at the cliff where she and Foulques fought- the last place she would ever see him. She knelt at the edge, uncaring of the precariousness of her position, and stared into the misty chasm. Wondering if beyond the blanket of fog, he might be out there somewhere, or if there was even a body left. 

She'd heard from some of her fellow adventurers that in the Palace of the Dead there was a foe that was very similar to Foulques. Whenever she had a spare moment she would dive into the Palace, hoping to see him just one more time. Just once, to send him off properly if he was in fact dead. But for the entirety of at least six moons, she hadn’t managed to catch a glimpse of even his shadow. 

_ Either he does not want to be found, in which case I have no hope of ever seeing him, or he is not there, in which case I...no. To have hope and lose it will destroy what few defenses I have left. I must not. I can’t afford to lose again.  _

_ Still...I suppose having closure would be nice. _

That decided, she tied one end of a climbing rope to her waist and the other to a stout tree. Taking one last look over the edge of the cliff, she turned and slid off the edge of the cliff, using the rope and rock face to slow her descent.

It didn’t take long for the light to start to first dilute, then disappear entirely. Fifty yalms down, the light had taken on a watery hue and by the time she crossed a hundred yalms, she could not see at all. To fill the almost dead silence in the space she was traversing, she quietly sang to herself, timing her bounces to the beat.

After what felt like forever, her feet finally found the ground. She sighed in relief, and then switched to her black mage set with a tug of aether. She’d need fire here- for all she knew, this was just another ledge and the actual bottom was still a long way off. She hoped that wasn’t the case though. She didn’t have much rope left.

_ 'Whisper my secrets, soul-fire, wandering lost on the road.' _ A fireball formed and floated off her hand, bobbing in front of her and casting a soft glow on the road. Briefly she wondered if this was what her dad meant when he said the way to the afterlife was long and dark.

The sounds of battle reached her before she saw it. Out of habit, she ran to it, her little seeing flame growing in response to the prospect of battle. 

What her fire illuminated stopped her dead in her tracks. 

Foulques. That was Foulques in the middle of that throng of palace mobs. She shouted something that came out in Hingan and her fireball grew, shooting towards the hindmost mob. It exploded on contact, killing most of the back line while Foulques finished off the front. Another few blasts and all of the remaining beasts lay slain.

"Foulques, are you-" she approached him, but stopped when he levelled his spear at her. 

"Come no closer, fiend!" he snarled, moving as if to lunge at her. The lunge, however, turned into him pitching unsteadily forward. Without thinking she clipped her staff, stepped forward and caught him, her stomach rolling uneasily as she felt a warm slickness on her hands. 

“Ah, you’re injured!” she yelped, immediately swapping to her conjurer’s set- which was a mistake, as her little guide-fire vanished. She felt him grow slack in her grip. “Foulques? Hey, Senior, stay with me!” No response, though she could at least hear him breathing. Not that it was much better considering how labored it was. She took a moment to collect herself and slowly set him on the ground, fumbling with his armour until she somehow managed to loosen some of it. She pulled at what aether she could and began concentrating it into a Cure spell, mumbling as she did so. It wasn’t very strong but at least the biggest ones were closing. Once she was sure he was healed enough to at least travel a bit, she hoisted him onto her back, used some of the extra rope to tie him on and followed the main line back to where she climbed down. 

_ He is heavier than I thought, or perhaps I’m just not that strong, actually. _ Mingxia shoved beef jerky down her throat, braced herself and hopped up, digging her shoes into the side of the cliff. She then began the long, slow climb back up.

By the time she managed to haul both herself and Foulques over the lip of the cliff, her arms were starting to go numb and her legs had this persistently painful buzz. Fumbling with her whistles, she blew Chobelle’s. A cheerful ‘kweh-heh!’ greeted her, but that quickly became a concerned chirping when he saw the state of his hyur. “It’s nothing to worry about, Chobelle, not me, at least. Can you carry my friend back to my house? Make sure he doesn’t fall off, that nobody will steal him again?” She undid the makeshift harness from herself, hunching slightly forward to prevent Foulques from sliding off.

“Kweh!” The large bird chirped and nodded, ducking his head down to slide Foulques onto his back. 

“Thank you, my trusty sidekick,” Mingxia said, patting the bird’s shoulder. “Once we get home, I’ll have krakka roots and gysahl greens ready for you.”

"Kweh?"

"Yes, you can have the one with the juicy worms. The bag is next to your head in your room."

“Kweh-kweh!” The large bird trotted off down the road, Mingxia staggering along beside him.

Somehow after about two bells (thank Menphina it was the dead of the night, there were less people around) they made it back to her home. She brought Foulques downstairs while Chobelle wandered to his stall where a bag of his favourite mix was hanging.  _ Good thing I left such a big bag there this morning. Now then, let's get the hard parts done. _

She knocked back an espresso and pulled her conjurer's set on. Then she eased off his armour and got to work.

It became obvious very quickly that he'd been in a lot of fights. The how and the why could wait. He had a pulse, he was breathing, and by the Wanderer's bow, she wasn't losing this friend too.  _ As for whether he still thinks of me as such, well, that can wait, too. _

_ Esuna. Cure. Cure. Regenerate. _

…

_ "-bear away the hurts of yesterday, unto the earth to settle and keep. And the wind shall come, the wind shall come..." _ He was briefly aware of someone singing and soothing waves washing over him. He drifted away with them, too exhausted to question it.

Foulques woke with a start on a strange bed (the scent was oddly familiar though), in a strange house without his armour. He almost thought he'd been captured, but that couldn't be. His weapon and gear were leaning against the wall, cleaned and repaired, and he was unbound. 

Sunlight streamed down from upstairs. It had to be at least midday then, judging from the strength of the light. The aroma of cooking food and tea filled the air, mixed with someone singing. He grabbed his spear and went upstairs, meaning to settle this mystery.

...

" _ At last one returns from the evergreen gla- _ oh! Good afternoon, Foulques. How are you feeling?" Mingxia chirped as she set the bowls of food down at her table. 

"Hale enough," he replied curtly, staring down at her.

"...well, that's good at least. Care to join me for lunch?" She stood there, smiling at him- a too-bright smile strained with every motion she made. A brightness that did not reach her eyes. It would have been easy to take his revenge and leave- she was so utterly unguarded it was hard to tell whether she was fearless, stupid, or both.

He would not, however. He took a seat on one of the benches, idly noting the foreign make of it. Regardless of the past, she must have been the one who brought him back from the throat of those accursed ruins. He would have certainly died if she had not appeared, so he could be civil, at least.

Mingxia sat down on the opposite end of the same bench and offered him a bowl of some sort of stew. "Antelope stew," she said. "Sorry if it's a bit gamier than it should be. I used gazelle meat." He nodded and accepted the bowl. Food was food, and it was interesting to note that she still had that particular habit.

A heavy silence hung over them as they ate. It would have been easy to fill- it had been at least two years since they last saw each other. But then, the last time they'd seen each other, they'd fought, and he had fallen. Mingxia kept stealing glances at him, always looking as if she wanted to say something. She didn't say anything, however, always returning to her food with a complicated expression.

At last, she set down her spoon, turned to face him properly, and bowed her head. “I...understand if you hate me for what happened those two and some years ago. You took your time to train this foolish girl and I failed you when we were tested. I did not learn swiftly enough, and when I finally saw what you were trying to show me, you were already gone.” 

He leaned back and regarded her through narrowed eyes. He didn’t exactly  _ like _ how it turned out the last time, but going to say outright hatred was too strong. Ywain’s influence was like that- the novices all met him as a respectable figure, and so they wouldn’t know something was wrong until it burned them in some way. Even if he didn’t know it firsthand, it wasn’t hard to see in the way the recruits acted. That itself wasn’t bothering him that much though.

It was infuriating how  _ meek _ she was. What had she been  _ doing _ for the past few years? It was clear she was stronger. She’d been busy, he assumed, since she was still technically an adventurer. But somewhere along the way, the fire he chose her for got put out- and it was painfully obvious in how she carried herself.

“Raise your head,” he commanded. “You took your time, but that lesson it seems, you have learned. Meet me outside. I would test your courage once more. I did not choose a lamb to be my student.”

Mingxia stiffened. Aether swirled around her and she was once again wearing the strawberry pink of a new lancer. “...Very well,” she said, rising unsteadily and gripping her weapon with a surety that spoke of long hours of practice. Her gait was stilted, every motion screaming unwillingness- or perhaps it was fatigue.

They faced each other in her yard. She bowed to him as if greeting a superior in the Yanxian fashion, and drew her spear. Foulques attacked first, closing the distance with a powerful leap. She met his strike with an upward sweep, deflecting the blow and spinning the pole to counter. He used the momentum from her parry to block her counter and disengaged. He leapt on her again with more ferocity, seeing how she stood where she was and would not approach. She went on the defensive, blocking, parrying and occasionally countering, but never truly committing to attacking. As if she was holding back. And that, beyond anything else, was  _ infuriating. _

“Is that all? You truly have become like those cravens you stood with.” Foulques spat out in disgust. “Perhaps I was wrong about you. Better for you to have left me at the bottom of a cliff than to be rescued by a coward.”

_ Thwack! _

Suddenly, as if something had snapped in her, she snarled and lunged at him in a whirlwind of movement. He was only just able to parry her strikes as she spun and jabbed, and when he went on the offensive, she not only deflected, but returned the attacks with a force bordering on unhinged. Soon, both of them were locked in a deadly dance with sharp weapons that had the nearby residents avoiding the area. 

“Don’t call me one of them!” she shrieked as they traded blows. She barely seemed to notice as cuts and gashes opened along her arms and legs in her efforts to avoid the deadlier of Foulques’ attacks. Her fury was glassy-eyed, as if she weren’t truly seeing who was in front of her as she parried and struck. “I will  _ never _ be one of them! Each and all, led by a negligent cockerel who will not watch after his own!”

Foulques winced as her speartip caught his shoulder and wondered momentarily if this is how he looked the last time he fought her. That thought lay forgotten in the thrill of the battle, a fight reminiscent of his previous training regimes. He laughed wildly, running high on the adrenaline of facing a difficult opponent.

Though they appeared to be just about matched, as he wove ice magic into his attacks, she replied with fire (should have seen that one coming), nullifying the terrain he set and slowly, but surely driving him back towards her rear fence. Just as she was about land the deciding strike that would also punt him into the river, she stopped, pointing her spear at his throat for all of half a minute. Her breaths came harsh and ragged with exertion. “Can I stop now?” she asked. He lowered his weapon.

“I concede. You have grown since the last time we met.” With that, she dropped her spear, staggered back several steps and fell to her knees. 

“I can’t feel my legs,” she stated flatly. “Please stop making me fight you like this. I’d be happy enough if you wanted my life as compensation for all the trouble I caused you. You’ve been in the Palace for a while, right? You’re a lot stronger than last time. But please stop challenging me like this. I don’t know if I can hold back anymore.” She put a hand over her heart and wheezed. 

“Then fight at your fullest. Any less is an insult.”

“I shouldn’t. It’s scary.” She looked down at her hands, buried in the skirt of her tunic. “When you get too strong, all the people around you can see is a weapon.” Foulques said nothing, silently waiting for her to continue. She rambled on, her voice thick and choked. “I’ve been pointed at everything conceivable and told, ‘Warrior, go kill it’. Been too good at it. I seem to have a knack for killing off friends too. The ones that are left are too busy, too far afield. I’m- I’m glad you got out of there. It’s good to see a friendly face again, you know?” She forced a smile, and bowed her head again. “...For however long this will last.”

Foulques sat down next to her. While he thought he might understand the feeling, since it at least sounded similar to what being a Wood Wailer entailed to a degree, he wasn’t entirely sure what to do in this situation. “Then you keep winning.” Mingxia raised her head to stare blearily at him. “While I believe you to have questionable taste in friends, you will have more time to spend if you continue to win. It is unlike you to flee from whatever you fear, anyroad.”

“...Maybe it’s good that I’m scared.” Mingxia muttered tiredly, leaning towards him. Foulques glanced questioningly at her. “You said I should just keep winning. Fear means I still care enough to want to keep something. I’ll fight harder like that, now that I’m not...now that you came back.” She rested her head against his shoulder and closed her eyes. “No but seriously, I’m glad you’re alright. I’ve been trying to find you in the Palace for a while.”

“I noticed,” he replied, awkwardly wrapping an arm around her shoulders.

“Heard me calling? You could have said hello.”

“Your companions would have tried to kill me.”

“If you don’t try to skewer me first I’m sure I could have convinced them.”

“Pray tell how you would have done that."

"Well, a lot of the frequent explorers of the palace know me as a lovelorn road cone- their words, not mine." Mingxia paused to rub her legs. "I usually ask them to tell me if they see you. I just...I couldn’t forget you, my senior who taught me the elegance of this weapon. ...Pardon me if I am too sentimental.” She was answered by a brief pressure on her arm tugging her closer. She didn’t see Foulques cover his mouth to hide the brief splash of colour that came and went. 

They sat in a comfortable silence until the sun began to dip below the horizon, at which point they went back into the little house. There was still a lot to do, and yet more to unpack, but there would be time for that.

_ “Then I have nothing to fear, King of the Dead. I am blind and can only know the one I sought is near me still.” _

**Author's Note:**

> Self-indulgent piece made in celebration of finally owning a house in the Lavender Beds. Also, that awkward feeling when you want to write fluff, but the fic has other ideas.


End file.
